


where the wind blew free

by thelostcolony



Category: Penny Dreadful (TV)
Genre: Ethan and his mixed religious beliefs, Ethan has a Lot of dads ok, Ethan is delirious & tryina come to terms with things & it's Going Badly, Ethan loves horses ok, Ethan's fav is Ratchet, Gen, Heat Stroke, No Hecate, OC Horses - Freeform, Rewrite of 3x5, We Do Not Stan Hecate Poole, it's brief, mentions of throw up, s3e5: This World Is Our Hell
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-11
Updated: 2019-10-11
Packaged: 2020-12-08 23:43:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20985233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelostcolony/pseuds/thelostcolony
Summary: How season three, episode five would have gone if Ethan had been alone in the desert with nothing but his thoughts and a stolen horse.There's a lot to come to terms with in the unforgiving heat.





	where the wind blew free

—

Ethan’s so thirsty.

He licks his cracked lips, hoping to find some relief, but all it does is pull at them. Wetness makes him press them together. The taste of copper touches his tongue. He’s reopened the wounds there.

The sun is ruthless. It bears down on him, sadistic in its heat, scorching the back of his neck and head. His scalp and his cheeks are probably burnt. He’s been bent over for a while now. He doesn’t remember when he decided that was a better position.

He’s so thirsty.

It consumes his thoughts. He thinks of how London is, heavy with fog and damp with the promise of rain, the gentle mist on every inhale. He thinks he’s never been so hydrated as he was in London. He thinks he’ll never be hydrated again. He’ll dry out here, crusty and craisin, unappealing to even the vultures who'd pick upon him.

The horse plods on, faithful.

Clumsily, he raises a hand to pat at its neck. The coat there is dry and hot, not even the slightest bit damp with sweat. Whatever heat he’s suffering from, this horse is suffering further. However thirsty he is, this horse is thirstier. But she carries him still. Faithful to the last.

It’s funny. Ethan has always been kind to those he rode — Ratchet in particular, but Ratchet is his horse and his alone. He’d never been as kind to Ratchet as he felt he should be, his father and other riders demanding he use a firm hand. He’d learnt a gentler way when he lived among the Chiricahua, brushing and braiding and painting.

This horse hasn’t known any of that. He’d stolen it off one of those devils his father had hired — his Talbot father — and hasn't looked back. He hopes the snakes feed off their corpses. He hopes Coyote enjoys his offering.

He wishes he had a saddle so that she wasn't straining to carry him so much. He hasn’t had much to offer her. Nothing but company and more weight to carry across the desert. But he’s not running her ragged. And she’s still walking. She’s still alive.

He pats her neck again, hand numb and trembling. “‘f we get outta this,” he wheezes, pressing his cheek to her shifting shoulder blade, “I’ll name y’good and proper.” Something Chiricahua, maybe. His Apache father would be so pleased. 

He’s so thirsty. 

He misses London. Heavy mist, deep, dark fog. The sky had been cloudy all the time, but it was better than the brutal sun. Here it was so hard to see everything with your eyes fully open: they were always shut against the glare. You always had to look away. In London, everything was clearer. Easier to see. At least, it was for Ethan. 

He misses London. He misses Vanessa, and Malcolm. And Victor. And Mister Lyle, too. He misses them a lot.

The horse stumbles, and he grunts as he’s violently shifted, nearly slipping off her back. “Whoa,” he rasps, and weakly grips at her hair. “Easy, there, easy.” Below him, she inhales laboriously, trying to get oxygen into her lungs. Ethan’s breath hitches for her, matching her rhythm. 

They’re so thirsty. They’re dying.

If he had any water left, he’d cry. As it is, all his face does is scrunch up, trying to prevent tears that won’t fall anyway. They’re dying. They’re going to die out here, alone and withered. Shriveled to nothing but bones and tanned hide. He’ll never see his London family again. His Apache father would laugh, if he could see Ethan now. 

But he’d learned kindness from the Chiricahua. He can… he can impart that on so faithful a companion. Below him, the horse shudders with the effort of her next steps. 

His tongue comes out to lick his lips again, but all he tastes is sand. “‘S okay, darlin’,” he whispers, throat unable to make proper sound. “‘f you gotta… lie down, you… you do that. Don’t worry abou’ me.”

The horse stumbles again, and this time she goes down to her front knees with a soft neigh of alarm. Ethan lurches and slides completely off her, tumbling to the crusty earth. He doesn’t even feel the impact. He lands on his shoulder, is rolled by momentum onto his back, and his face is exposed to the sun again. Beside him, the horse heaves for air.

He doesn’t have any strength, but he does reach out and tangle his fingers in the horse’s mane. “‘S okay,” he croaks. “‘f you can keep walkin’ now… y’should. ‘S okay. You can… leave me here. Thanks for… carryin’ me… so long, darlin’.”

The horse nuzzles at his cheek, hot breath fanning across his face. He reaches up to wrap his arms around her head, but they fail him halfway through. They flop to his sides, useless.

He opens his mouth for air, and coughs as he inhales the dust in the breeze. His tongue is like sandpaper. His mouth hurts. His lips hurt.

He’s so thirsty.

— 

He wakes up.

For a minute he stares at the sprawl of stars above him, trying to make his sluggish mind make sense. The world is blanketed in darkness, the cold of the night already having swept across the desert. He’s stiff. His body aches. His head hurts like hell. He’s amazed he woke up at all.

He’s not cold. There’s a line of warmth pressed against his side. It’s not the cruel heat of the sun. It’s different. Comforting. The body beside him breathes.

He painstakingly turns his head to the side, stiff neck moving in jolty increments. God, his head aches. The horse lays there, head raised and ears twitching, alert. _ Alive_. Still here.

Ethan exhales, disbelieving. 

He feels marginally stronger now that he’s had a rest. It’s long past sunset, and the break from the heat and the sun have done some good: he feels like he can think now, at least a little coherently. His thoughts take years to form and comprehend, limping like a carriage missing a wheel, but they form. He blinks, breath fogging in front of him as he breathes. His stomach rolls, and he’s thirsty, and his head pounds, but he’s alive.

It takes ages for him to actually decide to move. He doesn’t want to. He feels washed out. Bleached. He’s afraid that if he moves, he’ll crumble like the dust clinging to his lips. But it’s better to cross the desert at night. They’ve taken the time to rest. He’s… he can make it. 

And the horse waited. That was awful nice.

“‘M gonna need help gettin’ back on,” he whispers, tongue feeling too swollen for his mouth. There’s no saliva. Everything feels like sandpaper. “Just… stay nice’n still for me. Okay?” 

The horse doesn’t move. Her breathing is measured.

Ethan sighs. Then, he hauls himself upright, and drapes himself over the horse’s back.

The horse snorts, but doesn’t jerk like he expects. Gritting his teeth, he digs cold fingers into the warm earth, using what little leverage he can to lift his leg over her side and ensure he won’t slide right off again when she stands up. His limbs are dull and uncooperative, weak as a newborn calf’s, but after some wiggling he manages it.

Wheezing, lying sprawled over his companion, it takes him several minutes to get his pounding heart back under control. In this position, his stomach twists, bile rushing up his throat, and he has to consciously take deep breaths through his nose to quell the feeling.

When he’s finally settled, he presses his cheek to her shoulder blade, patting her shakily. Whatever strength he’d regained has fled him now. He can’t lift his head.

She seems to take the pat as an indication he’s set, because it’s not long after that she lurches to a standing position. He manages to stay on during the jerky ride, and as soon as she’s standing what little balancing he'd done has sapped him so much that he can’t imagine moving any further. He’s so nauseous he wants to die.

Somewhere in the distance, a wolf howls, and several join in. The chorus echoes around the canyons they’re crossing, reverberating back to them. The hair at the back of Ethan’s neck stands on end.

The horse doesn’t seem to care. She snorts, just once, and then continues on. 

Ethan’s head hurts. He’s thirsty, and his stomach is trying to turn itself inside out. The best option is to sleep, but for all his exhaustion, he’s hyper-vigilant. His eyes strain in the distance, trying to see more than just the wavering horizon line.

The first time he’d crossed this desert, it had been with Ratchet. He’d been young at the time, young enough to think that crossing the desert was an adventure rather than a death sentence. It was amazing to him, even now, that he and Ratchet had survived. They’d turned back. Gotten hopelessly lost. It was only the discovery of a small stream that had saved both their lives. There's something clever in there about leading horses to water, but Ethan’s mind isn't working well enough to think of it.

His thoughts stray. He thinks fleetingly of what awaits him if he survives this trek, but that does nothing but make him wish for his own death. Instead, he forces his thoughts to turn to Vanessa, waiting for him back in England. To Victor, and to Malcolm. To his cozy room at Grandage Place, and the things he'll put in it when he returns. He didn’t get to bring much with him, the first time… maybe he’ll bring more of his tribe’s things now. Maybe he’d bring his _ epuntltesis_, made for his first battle. A few photos of Mary, and Paul, and his mother.

He smacks his lips. It’s reflexive more than it’s yearning now, like his body has accepted that Ethan can’t and won’t provide water. It makes him think of the delicate wines in Grandage Place, the champagnes and even the absinthe he’d shared with Mister Gray, all lined up in their pretty bottles and poured out carefully, so as to not spill a drop. A drop seems like such a waste to him, now. What he wouldn’t do for a drop of water. Two, actually. One for his friend.

She keeps a steady pace beneath him, faithful to the last. He doesn’t know how he got so lucky; he’d stolen her at random, picked from a lineup of horses. The bandits — his father’s men — hadn’t seemed particularly unhappy with his choice, considering most of them had been killed by the snakes. _ Tł'iish: _a bad omen. Although, it could be argued that they saved his life.

He wonders what Vanessa would say about all this. Wonders if she’d think they were a bad omen or not. He’s always thought, with his particular condition, that he’s a wolf, all bared teeth and torn skin. But maybe he’s a snake. Maybe that’s what his spirit guide is.

Or maybe it’s a horse. Certainly seems like it, in this instance.

His Apache father would have a lot to say about it. He’d smoke his pipe and talk for hours and never say anything at all. He did so like to baffle in that way. Ethan had spent many nights at his Apache father’s side, warming himself by the fire, only to be given the cold comfort of words too cryptically spoken. He has never called Kaetenay _ t’aah_, though he’s never known if it’s out of fear of rejection or acceptance. He doesn’t know which he’d prefer.

It’s difficult, to love someone so fiercely and hate them so fervently. He doesn’t have that problem with any of his London pack — but then again, perhaps it’s simply that the love began first, and he hasn’t had time to begin to hate them. He doesn’t know. Everything is a mystery to him.

He sees the sky lighten long before the sun greets them. They’ve walked through the rest of the night, undisturbed by its creatures (supernatural or no). Whether that’s by the grace of God, or Yusn, or the _ Ga’ns_, Ethan is grateful for it. 

They have a little time before the sun fully rises. He has no clue where they are, and without being able to sit up, he can’t exactly tell. Everything looks… well, different when you’re looking at it sideways. The most Ethan can do is trust that this horse — spirit guide — whatever it may be knows where it’s going. 

There’s _ another _clever lead a horse to water line, but he’s still not with it enough to grasp it.

He must doze, because he cracks open his eyes and the sun is above him. He blinks, bleary, and it takes him several seconds to realize that there’s noise going on around him. It’s a far cry from the dry plod of hooves and the ominous silence, and it takes him several seconds longer than it should to process it. The echo of more hooves than the four beneath him. The sound of someone shouting his name.

His headache flares, white hot like a poker. He lists further over the side of the horse and abruptly throws up.

There’s nothing to throw up. It burns. It’s just bile. His body is using all its resources to try and keep him alive.

“Ethan!” the pound of feet. The horse jerks below him, letting out a whinny of panic, but she doesn’t rear up or buck. She doesn’t have the energy. Or maybe she’s conscientious of him. “Ethan, my God.”

He knows… he knows that voice. Soft, stern, sturdy. Gunpowder and opium, when he first heard it. Crackle of a fire. Too much whiskey. Malcolm.

He doesn’t open his eyes. He doesn’t remember shutting them. “Wha…. th’fuck… are _ you _doin’ here,” he slurs, voice a croak. Some rest seems to have done his throat good, for all he still can’t speak. A hand presses against his cheek in reply, thumbing at something that throbs to life. He winces, hissing. “Don’ touch.”

The hand remains, though the pain lessens. “You never know where I’ll pop up,” Malcolm says, voice deceptively mild. The man is good at disguising himself — everything but his eyes. If Ethan could figure out how to open his, he’d be able to see what Malcolm was really thinking. “You’ve done quite a number on yourself.”

“Wasn’ on purpose.”  
  
“As I gleaned.”

God… _ God _ he missed Malcolm. “What’re you doin’ here,” he rasps again.

Malcolm hums. “That doesn’t matter now,” he says, and Ethan feels something cold press against his lips. “Drink, slowly.”

Clumsily, his hand quivers upwards to hold the canteen, though all he does is find Malcolm’s wrist. His hand decides for him that’s a good place to stop, and his fingers curl around the cuff there, hanging on for support as the water is tipped into his mouth.

It’s like drinking from God’s eternal spring. Never in his life has Ethan felt as blessed, as anointed, as christened as he does in this moment. The world fades away, and all that exists is this sacred water, brought to him through impossible odds by a man who shouldn't be here, but is. He doesn’t know who’s working that is. He doesn’t know which god did it, but he doesn’t care. Holy hell, he doesn’t care.

“Slowly,” Malcolm says. Ethan swallows; he realizes that he’s been making soft keening noises, and does his best to close his throat against them. “Slowly, now, or you’ll be sick.” Malcolm makes the decision for Ethan, pulling the canteen away much too soon.

Ethan gasps pitifully, fingers scraping at Malcolm’s sleeve. “Already was.”

“You’ll be sick, Ethan,” Malcolm repeats patiently. “We’ll see how that sits for you.”

Ethan doesn’t quite manage to clamp down on the mournful sound that escapes him, but it does somehow make him remember the horse. The panic that races through him finally makes his eyes open: Malcolm is blurry, just a bunch of colors and a hat, but he’s there. “The horse,” Ethan gasps, desperate. “Please, give her some. She needs it.”

“So do you.” Malcolm’s tone holds no sympathy.

“Please,” Ethan pleads. “She’ll die. She carried me all — all this way.” His breath hitches.

Malcolm sighs, and shifts. Ethan watches through blurry vision as he removes his hat and tips some of the canteen’s contents into it. “Very well,” he says, grudgingly. “I suppose we owe the beast.” Malcolm moves from his line of sight.

Ethan feels the minute she recognizes it as water. Her body stiffens and then loosens all at once, as if a great weight has been lifted from her, and she drinks noisily, senselessly like he had. Somewhere above him, Malcolm makes a shushing noise, slowing her down just as he’d slowed Ethan. 

Something inside him begins to relax. That survival instinct, that tightening noose, finally slackens. He can breathe. They’re… they’re going to live.

It’s a dazzling thought.

“You smile in such strange situations, my son,” says Kaetenay, and his shadow appears before Ethan, shielding his gaze from the sun. Abruptly, Ethan's smile vanishes. “Though you have always seen the good within the bad.”

“What are you doing here?” Ethan growls, though it cracks pathetically, not at all threatening. He’s still too deprived of water to speak above a strained rasp. 

“Looking for you,” Kaetenay says, and Ethan’s eyes finally adjust. They’re still blurred around the edges, fuzzy where his peripheral vision would be, but he can see Kaetenay — and the way he grips his arm, sleeve rolled to the elbow — clear as day. A snake bite.

How fitting.

Ethan’s grin returns, savage this time. "_Tł'iish,” _ he grates in Kaetenay’s language. _“You ran into bad luck, old man.” _

_ “No more bad luck than what you evaded,” _Kaetenay says in return.

Ethan’s thoughts, previously a trickle, finally catch up to him. _ “What are you doing here together?” _

Kaetenay waves his question away. “A question for another time,” he says in English. “We must first get out of the sun, and get you and your guide rest.”

_ “My spirit guide,” _Ethan mutters in Apache. "_Called it.” _

Kaetenay, predictably, ignores him in favor of looking past him, over his head. “Riders approaching,” he warns, and Malcolm shuffles back into Ethan’s field of vision just before the sound of shouting men and the clatter of hooves hits him.

His father’s men caught up to them somehow. He’d faced the desert, all its perils — put his guide at risk — for nothing. His eyes burn, but he still isn’t hydrated enough for tears. As if sensing his need to see, the horse shifts on its feet until Ethan is facing the right way, so he can track the rider’s approach.

Rance is in the lead because of course he is, the bastard. “So, the prodigal son returns,” he says, mustache as bold as ever. The boys all dismount from their saddles, cocking their guns. Ethan wishes he had the strength to sit up. “Your daddy will be _real_ happy to see you.”

Experience has taught Ethan to keep his mouth shut, though there’s nothing less he wants to do as they’re surrounded. Malcolm is held at gunpoint. Kaetenay is seized by the collar. Two men approach the horse, and she whinnies again, more alarmed, frantic. She rears a little, only slightly, not enough to displace him.

“Whoa, whoa! Go easy, Christ’s sake!”

“Atta'girl,” Ethan murmurs into her coat, just before he’s dragged from her back.

He hits the ground hard: unlike the first time, he feels the impact. It reverberates up his legs and into his teeth, and his knees give out on him. He’s grabbed by the arms, hauled upright, and he struggles to get his feet under him as they yank him forward to present to Rance, all smug and smirking, pricklier than a cactus.

“Whaddaya got t’say for yourself?” Rance says, and Ethan squints up at him and doesn’t reply.

“What are we gonna do with this ‘un?” The boy holding Kaetenay says, and Rance shrugs and looks at Ethan.

And, well, there hasn't been a single thing that Ethan hasn’t seen his Apache father get out of yet, and that includes many brushes with death. And honestly, the fucker can rot in the desert for all he cares. Ethan licks his lips. “Let him die slow,” he says.

Malcolm instantly protests. “You can’t leave him here, Ethan! He'll die!”  
  
“He ain’t worth the bullet,” Ethan says, bowing his head. He summons what little strength he has left; he’s scraping the bottom of the well here, but he has to do one last thing, just — just for his own sake. It takes several seconds, but Ethan manages to get to standing on his own two feet.

He takes shambling steps towards Rance, until he’s almost touching the man’s knee where he sits in the saddle. Rance raises an eyebrow at him. “What are you doin’, boy?”

Ethan bares his teeth and sucks in through his nose. “Thankin’ you for such a nice homecomin’,” he says thickly, and then hocks a loogie directly into Rance’s right eye.

His aim, as ever, is true, and as his father’s henchman wipes away the spit and glares, Ethan has the spectacular privilege of saying “fuck you, Rance” right before he faints dead away.

**Author's Note:**

> Hello ! Thank you so much for reading, I hope you enjoyed ! I wasn't sure if this fandom was totally dead or not (considering I'm a wee late to the party), so I really appreciate you giving this fic a go. I'd love to read a comment about what you think of it !
> 
> I have some different sources to credit: regarding Ethan's faith, I thought it was interesting that he seemed to have adopted both the Apache beliefs and retained his own Christianity, and wanted to play a little with that here. A few terms that I feel should be defined:
> 
> epuntltesis: a leather garment worn by Apache Indians when engaging in battle. (source: https://www.warpaths2peacepipes.com/indian-tribes/apache-tribe.htm).  
ga'ns: Mountain gods specific to the Apache tribes, which were used mostly in puberty or healing stories and which I felt were appropriate here because Ethan believes he's being helped to healing. (source: https://www.legendsofamerica.com/na-apache/).  
Yusn: the name of the Creator that the Apache believe in (also spelled Ussen). (source: https://www.legendsofamerica.com/na-apache/).  
T'aah: meaning father in the Western Apache dialects. (source: https://glosbe.com/apw/en/t%CA%BCaah).  
tł'iish: meaning snake in the Western Apache dialects. (source: http://www.native-languages.org/apache_animals.htm).
> 
> Any other knowledge used, such as the mention of Coyote, is derived from here: http://www.native-languages.org/. 
> 
> The title of this fic is taken from a Geronimo quote, which can be found here: http://multilingualbooks.com/wp/soundandvision/2014/10/28/apache-quotes-stories/. 
> 
> I couldn't find the origin of the phrase "hock a loogie", but I love it as Ethan's thought process and so kept it in. :P
> 
> If any of this at all is incorrect, please please please tell me! I did as much research as I could before posting this in order to make it as accurate as possible, but there are always errors and I really would love the help! 
> 
> Again, thank you so much for reading, I hope you enjoyed, and please leave me a comment on your thoughts! I'm definitely thinking that this will be two chapters, but it'll definitely depend on whether or not you guys even want to see more so !


End file.
